The Citizen (Dar es Salaam)
5 November 2009
The Government said yesterday it would not honour new requests to split districts because of financial constraints.
The minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office (Regional Administration and Local Governments), Ms Celina Kombani, gave the position in Parliament yesterday.
A number of MPs pressed the government yesterday to split districts in which their constituencies were. They included include Mr William Shellukindo (Bumbuli-CCM), Mr Samson Mpanda (Kilwa North-CCM) and Dr Juma Ngasongwa (Ulanga West-CCM).
All of them argued that the districts were too vast for the authorities and social services to reach all people.
Mr Shellukindo, who asked the basic question, called for the splitting of Kilindi District, noting the residents of the area had been facing acute transport problems.
The Government turned down the request, noting that the district did not meet the criteria for the creation of a new district. These include size of the population, and number of villages, wards and divisions.
For his part, Dr Ngasongwa noted that the Ulanga West constituency had an area of 17,000 square kilometres, making the constituency larger than Kilimanjaro Region, which covers only 13,000 square kilometres.
He also said that the area had been experiencing an influx of people in recent years as pastoralists who have been evicted elsewhere had settled in Ulanga District.
But Ms Kombani, who comes from the neighbouring Ulanga East Constituency, Ulanga District too had not met criteria for the giving off of a new district.
"However, after completion of the current exercise on the establishment of new villages, we will revisit the application to see if there will be enough villages and wards to merit the splitting of Ulanga District," she said.
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